


This is the beat of my heart.

by imzadinot



Category: Carry On - Rainbow Rowell
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - In a Heartbeat, Fluff and Angst, Getting Together, I Blame Tumblr, M/M, POV First Person, Simon is Sherwin and Baz is Jonathon, SnowBaz, ik but it's necessary, it's just In a Heartbeat but with Simon and Baz, there's none of the drama from the book at all
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-13
Updated: 2017-08-13
Packaged: 2018-12-14 22:26:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11792745
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imzadinot/pseuds/imzadinot
Summary: That’s how it feels, heart hammering, taking my breath away, and without thinking, I let myself say the word out loud, trying them out, the feel of them against what’s going on inside my head. “Beating out of my chest.”





	This is the beat of my heart.

**Author's Note:**

> I have no rights to the characters or to the real plot line; I'm just borrowing them both to play house.
> 
> I wrote this at like two am after I saw In a Heartbeat because the idea wouldn't leave me alone so here we are. I also had great fun rediscovering how much I love the swearing used in Carry On. 
> 
> The title comes from This is Gospel by Panic! At the Disco because it seemed vaguely relevant when I wrote this and because I'm currently listening to Too Weird To Live, Too Rare To Die on repeat.

****Merlin. Merlin and Morgana and Methuselah, there he goes.

Walking by with his stupid smile and his gorgeous grey eyes and that annoying sneer on his face, doing that thing with an apple, spinning it round and round and round with one hand as he always does when he’s distracted.

I don’t know how he doesn’t drop it. 

Why doesn’t he drop it? Maybe there’s a spell he uses, but I can’t think of a turn of phrase that would have such an effect. Maybe it’s not just a phrase but a rhyme, or a whole sonnet. Though no one would use so much magic for something so trivial. But maybe **_Round and round the garden_** could work. 

It would serve him right, really, if he dropped it. One moment of idiotic clumsiness, as though he was just another one of us mere mortals, rather than the graceful god he seems to think he is. 

Does he think he is? Or am I being unfair? 

I’m probably being unfair. 

I can’t help it, though. He’s- He’s perfect, and he knows it. He has to know it. He’s Tyrannus Basilton Grimm-Pitch. Of course he knows it. Bloody perfect, yet unattainable. I know that; hell, everyone knows that. No one’s good enough. 

Which means that this is all I am ever going to get, these moments when he walks past, lost in his thoughts and spinning an apple, his head down, not noticing me. 

He doesn’t see me, which has its perks. It means that I can stare, without being caught. It’s all I’m ever going to get, but at least I can stare without being interrupted. It would be hard to explain if I was seen to be mooning over Baz. It would be hard to explain and harder still to take the rejection. Because that’s what would happen. He’d reject me and it would fucking hurt. 

And that’s the best reason to keep my distance. To hide, really. Not in a stalker-ish way, though I guess it could be misconstrued as such. The fact that I’m watching from a tree might not help my case. But it’s a good vantage point, and I’m invisible. To Baz and to anyone else who might be out here, not that there is anyone. They’re all heading to class, as Baz is and I should be. There’s a spell I could use for this, could magic myself invisible with a **_There’s nothing to see here,_** but what’s the point?

It would only end badly, probably with me spelling myself so that I’m forever see through and that would be harder still to explain. 

The tree hides me as well as any spell would have, except for when I make the mistake of moving, hitting my head on a branch and causing such a fuss that it would have been impossible for Baz not to hear something, holding the apple still as he glances upwards. Even as I hide, I’m not entirely convinced that he didn’t see me. And, Crowley, my head hurts. 

He’s still stood there, staring up at the tree.

What if, what if he saw me?

The thought consumes me until the panic that I’ve been busted is the only thing running through my head, rivalled only by my heart racing, thundering, a steady thud that’s deafening and the only thing I can focus on. 

I must be more or less invisible from the ground, though, and Baz walks on, the apple twirling through the air once again.

He didn’t see me, and that should allow me to relax, but my heart is still hammering away, beating out of my chest. It’s not fair, that he makes me feel this way. 

It’s a weird feeling, a weird way of showing the effect a person can have on you, and an even weirder phrase. 

Beating out of my chest. 

That’s how it feels, heart hammering, taking my breath away, and without thinking, I let myself say the word out loud, trying them out, the feel of them against what’s going on inside my head. “ ** _Beating out of my chest_**.”

And- I didn’t mean to do that. Fuck. I did not mean to do that.

They’re not- Those words aren’t supposed to be a spell, but somehow, I’ve ended up summoning the meaning behind them, unleashing the power they contain and- And this isn’t supposed to happen. I’ve done this before, unintentionally, making a sort of compulsion spell, but this isn’t supposed to happen.

I forget, sincerity helps. It brings the words to life. And I’m always sincere. 

And this phrase, ‘beating out of my chest’, it- Well, it’s a way of showing how much you love someone. 

For one horrible moment, I expect something awful and horror film worthy to happen, for my heart to literally burst from my chest. Worse things have happened because of magic. Phrases such as **_Twist my arm_** and **_Candle in the wind_** can have similar effects if they’re used wrong. All metaphors are tricky, really. I once used **_Hair of the dog_** on someone and it worked sort of literally.

I’m still expecting blood and gore and something sort of painful to happen, but instead, my magic works sort of sideways, as it always does, and brings to life a cartoon of sorts. It comes directly from me, but it looks like the sort of thing supermarkets decorate boxes of chocolates and flowers and cards with around Valentine’s Day, a caricature of a heart, but it’s still my heart and it belongs to Baz and, Siegfried and fucking Roy, it’s…chasing after him. 

Oh God. Christ, it’s going right for him. This can’t- This can’t be happening. Oh God, it’s going after him and he’s going to know and oh God. 

There’s only one thing for it. I can’t let…it present itself to Baz, can’t let him find out how I feel, I can’t let it out me, not like this, not at all. It’s there, right- It’s right in his hand, taking the place of that damn apple, wherever that’s gone. He’s got…my heart in his hands and if he would just look up from that book he’d see and then. It’s probably best he’s not looked up from his book, else he’d have seen me stumbling out of the trees and after him, within arms reach of that fucking…thing. 

It’s smiling, the thing, whatever it is. 

It’s smiling as he spins it through the air, not having noticed that it clearly isn’t his bloody apple, as though it belongs there, in his hands. If I’m quick, I can reach it, though, and then I’ll figure it out, magic it back out of existence somehow, and no one will ever get to know how I feel. 

That’s a plan if ever that was one, and I’m just there, just in reach of the heart, fingers just closing over it, when it moves and I crash right into him. Into Baz, stumbling into him, my face practically pressed against his, so close that our noses would be touching if he wasn’t that little bit taller. Three inches, that’s all there is, but It means my nose reaches his chin and I don’t quite have to look him in the eye. 

Which is good.

He’s probably repulsed, confused, whatever, and if I looked him in the eye, I’m not sure I could take it. My fingers close over the thing, hiding it from sight, hiding my heart from view, and I make the mistake of looking up, even as I rush away, and I was right to not want to. 

It’s sort of a blur, a rush of movement — running away, is — and I don’t register where I’ve run to until I let out a breath, opening my eyes to realise that, apparently, I chose to hide in the bin. Go figure. Unfortunately, I’ve hidden in worse things or been found trapped in weirder places, like the time there was involving the goat barn or that other time when I got trapped in a well, and- Fuck a nine-toed troll. 

I’m hiding in a bin, from Baz, whom I just ran into, like a crazed moron and the thing in my hands is wriggling, desperate to be free, and I just sort of crashed into Baz.

This. This is the opposite of being invisible. I should just have used **_These aren’t the droids you’re looking for_** on myself, given that the potential repercussions of that spell couldn’t be worse than this. 

The thing, the heart, my heart, still wants to go after Baz, of course it does, of course I do, and, even as I climb out of the bin, it’s pulling me towards him. I’m just grateful, ridiculously grateful that everyone else is inside, heading to class, partly so no one can see me climbing out of the bin and party because no one then sees me fall over myself as I run after Baz. 

But I can’t. Approach him. Not again. Not after the embarrassment. I can’t. It, and I’m sticking with calling the thing it, now, I’ve decided, it’s pulling me towards him, though, determined, but I can’t. I turn away, veering and running asides, but it doesn’t last. Of course. This thing is stubborn, and I let go of it, purely by accident, tripping and falling and watching as it flies through the air, just skimming over the top of Baz’s hair and his stupid widow’s peak. 

He hasn’t noticed this time, not yet, and he’s nearly inside, and then I can just grab that thing and figure out what I’ll have to do to fix this. To make this thing disappear or pop back into my chest or wherever it came from, just so that nothing else happens. 

Baz is inside, the door falling shut behind him and everything will be fine. That thought is enough for me to let out the breath I’d been holding, relaxing ever so slightly. I’ll go back to the plan, figure this out and Baz will never find out how I feel about him. It’s for the best. As long as I get my heart back, get whatever happened sorted and never say that spell, those words, again, it’ll be fine. 

And I won’t bother anyone else with this, as hopeless as I am when it comes to anything magickal, this is definitely something I am not getting help for. Penny would have a field day and would want to try out the spell, or whatever it is, until everyone knew. Which is definitely not happening. 

The door is almost shut, and I can still see it, just shy of reaching the doors, but surely, it won’t make it. It can’t. Only, and I don’t know what I’ve done or which magic creature who’s-actually-real-but-you-wouldn’t-have-thought-so I’ve pissed off for them to ruin my life like this, but it does. 

It fucking makes it, squeezing through before the doors slam shut and it’s in the building with Baz and where all the others are and- Fuck.

Stevie Nicks and Gracie Slick, it’s inside, and it’s insistent on reaching Baz, and I am pretty much fucked. That’s my considered opinion. Fucked. 

Maybe, maybe Baz will understand, maybe he won’t be so repulsed by- Maybe he’ll. No. That’s just wishful thinking. But maybe it’s not so bad. He’ll know. Or maybe everyone’s already in class, so it’ll be just him and that way no one else will know. Baz will but- Oh God. 

The hallway is busy still, people hanging out in front of their lockers and gathering around Baz, who’s on the floor and that thing, the heart, my heart, is clinging to him. It fucking tackled him, by the looks of it, and he’s on the floor and everyone is watching.

I grab for it, hand closing around part of it, and I tug, though it’s insistent. It belongs with Baz, or it wants to, and I just want to go. I can’t watch this. He looks. Confused. Blank. But it, the- My heart, it’s holding on to him, adamant, and it won’t let go, no matter how hard I pull. Everyone is watching. There are glares being thrown our way and Baz didn’t ask for any of this, but they’re staring at him, too.

My eyes meet his and I watch as a slow look of understanding passes over his face, though he still doesn’t do anything. I tug and then the heart breaks and that’s how I know that, whatever it is, it’s my heart, it’s my heart and I feel the tearing sensation as it rips in two, one half in Baz’s hands, the other hidden in my own, and it’s broken and it fucking hurts. It hurts more than anything and he’s not doing anything and then I’m running again.

Running back out the doors and outside and until I collapse behind the tree, what’s left of my heart in my hands, fighting back everything. I can feel the tears threatening to spill over, I can feel the ache in my chest, I can feel how still my heart is. I can feel everything. 

But it’s okay. It’s okay. Of course, he didn’t do anything. He didn’t have to. It’s my own fault, for the spell, for having these stupid feelings. 

It’s okay. It’s- I’m okay. I’m okay. I am. Or, I will be. It’s just a- He’s just a boy. 

It’s better when I close my eyes, because I can’t see anything and I can pretend that I am nowhere and nothing just happened. It’s, it’s better. I don’t have to see Baz, looking up at me with that blank look on his face as everyone else judged me. I guess, they were judging him too, though. They were. They must have been. I- This must have fucked things up for him, too. No wonder he did nothing. 

When I open my eyes, I’ll have to go back in there. I’ll have to go to class, to Magic Words, Advanced Linguistics, Magickal Science, whatever I’m supposed to have, and he’ll be there and it won’t be better. It’s not really better now, if I’m honest, but closing my eyes stops any more tears from escaping and that’s something at least. 

Opening them seems like too much of a challenge right now, though I can hear footsteps approaching me, so I might have to anyway. Even if it makes it all real again. 

It turns out to be Baz, standing over me now. His fingers are closed over the piece of…it, of my heart, he was left with and he looks…concerned. Apologetic, maybe. And then he’s not standing over me but sitting and he’s reaching for my hands. 

I can’t help it, I flinch. Even if it’s Baz and he’s- He’s sitting there with his gorgeous grey eyes and a look on his face that probably mirrors my own expression. He looks hurt by that, by my hesitancy, but what if- He’s reaching for my hands again, and he looks apologetic and vulnerable and like everything I’ve ever wanted. 

So I let him, I let him expose the shattered half, prising my fingers away and then he’s sort of holding my hand and putting the two halves back together and then- It, the stupid cartoon thing is back together again, and it is still my heart because it’s whole again and it doesn’t hurt, and it’s- Whatever it is, whatever was brought to life by that spell, is gone again, and it’s just me. And Baz. And he’s still holding my hand. 

And then he smiles at me, soft and shy, and I stop thinking. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thoughts?


End file.
